by Layton Green
Preach looked away. He knew that already; he was hoping for a miracle.
She went to the computer and researched the elements of the crime on Google. He had already done that, but he watched her scan the results, hoping she would uncover something new.
Five minutes passed, and then ten.
Nothing.
He clenched his fists. It felt as if he had made no progress in the case. How many more bodies would there be?
“What if Elliott’s death was unrelated to the other two?” she asked in a small voice. “A suicide or a natural cause? Or what if it’s related and there’s no novel this time? What if the first two were red herrings?”
Preach didn’t need to think about his response, because he was no longer dealing with logic. He was dealing with instinct. “There’s a book involved. Bank on it.”
“I’ll start researching right away, if you want,” she said.
He felt the relief manifest on his face. “Thank you,” he said, already moving to leave. “As soon you find something, even a suspicion, let me know.”
“I will.”
He paused at the door. He couldn’t leave her alone anymore. Not after three murders, not after the pot he was about to stir. “I’ll send a car for you tonight, or come myself. Okay?”
She looked as if she was going to protest, then gave a reluctant nod. Despite her attempt to hide it, her eyes crawled with fear.
Preach raced downtown at the tail end of rush hour, all too aware of the lateness of the hour. The traffic and streetlamps were a blur, a tunnel of muted colors and sounds.
Think.
Belker was incarcerated at the time of Elliott’s murder. The author could have paid someone beforehand to kill Elliott—but why? As far as Preach could tell, there was no motive. One theory: Mac had killed all three, using Belker as a hired gun on the first two and then deciding to silence Elliott as well. Close the loop.
Preach needed the toxicology report. He needed for Ari to be brilliant. Until then, there had to be a way to shake things up.
He stopped at a red light. It jogged something in his memory, something he had read about pattern recognition. How it was an evolutionary advantage.
Three people murdered in a matter of days. All friends, or at least former friends. Good friends. Childhood friends.
Terry had gotten his hands on copies of the school paper and a Creekville High yearbook, from the victims’ senior year. Nothing he had read had given Preach pause. As his mother had said, a sophomore named Deirdre Hollings had committed suicide, and one of the younger teachers had died from a heart attack. But none of the players in the present, besides the three deceased friends, appeared anywhere in the past.
While Preach didn’t understand Mac’s or Belker’s involvement, the pattern of victims was clear.
Explore the ties that bind. Find the link.
The rainbow flag hanging over Town Hall came into view, flapping in the breeze like the plumage of some exotic bird.
It was time to confront the mayor.
Preach’s cell rang. It was Terry. Preach took the call.
Officer Haskins told him that he had found someone, a retired English teacher named Elvis Klein, who remembered the Byronic Wilderness Society. Preach remembered him from his own days at Creekville High: tall, broad shoulders, kept his long hair in a ponytail. He was gruff and a little weird, but likable. Ran the drama club and the chess club.
Good. Klein had left his number, and Preach would try him tonight, after he talked to the mayor. If the former teacher didn’t pan out, he would try the names his aunt had given him. At least he had a few options.
He parked his car and braced for the storm.
39
Mayor Worthington sat primly behind a mahogany desk over-looking a tract of forest that included the byway leading to Ari’s apartment. A fact that did not escape Preach’s notice.
She checked her watch. “It’s late. What does Chief Higgins want?”
Rebecca Worthington’s compressed lips suggested power, ambition, and a willingness to let the ends justify the means. He supposed some men would find that attractive. Obviously Elliott Fenton had.
“The chief didn’t send me,” he said.
She drew back, eyes flickering.
“I’m here on my own.” He dropped into the chair in front of her desk. This was his hunch, his fallout. “Investigating the murder of Elliott Fenton.”
A look of regret passed across her face, quickly smothered. “And?” she said. “Is it connected to the other two murders you’ve failed to solve?”
“Do you have any information concerning Elliott’s activities last night?”
“Why would I know anything about that?”
“Because you’re his lover.”
Her mouth quivered as she worked to regain control. She interlocked her jeweled fingers on the desk. “Don’t be smart, Detective.”
“That’s not an accusation of which I’m typically on the receiving end.”
“I don’t know what you’re playing at, but the chief will hear about this in the morning. And we both know how thin the ice you’re standing on is.”
He kept his tone commiserative. The woman had just lost her lover. “If you loved Elliott, if you even liked him, then help me. When did he leave your house? Was anyone supposed to visit him? Who might want Elliott Fenton, Damian Black, and Farley Robertson murdered?” He leaned in. “I swear to you, if you accept my confidence, I’ll take your affair to my grave.”
She hesitated. It was the briefest of pauses, but long enough to confirm his suspicion.
She knew something.
When she spoke, her voice was laced with venom. “Leave my office. Now.”
If the mayor was withholding information, it meant one of two things. Either she cared about the potential fallout from the affair more than she cared about catching a murderer—or that whatever had gotten Elliott killed involved her.
She pointed at the door. “I won’t ask again.”
“Okay,” Preach said. “But I should tell you—not as a threat, but as a courtesy—that if I discover material information has been withheld, I will do everything in my power to insure this information comes to light.”
Her aquiline face tightened with fury. “And I will do everything in my power to ensure you’re looking for a new job by Monday.”
After she shut the door behind him, Preach took a few steps down the hallway and then paused. From where he was standing, in the window opposite her door, he could just barely see her reflection through a pane of glass.
The mayor had returned to her chair, hands balled into fists on top of her desk. After a moment of contemplation, she reached for the phone.
He couldn’t hear the conversation, but if his hunch was correct it wasn’t Chief Higgins she was calling.
An hour later, after shoveling down a bowl of soba noodles, Preach pulled up to the Island Gold Café on the edge of downtown. Elvis Klein had agreed to talk, and Preach didn’t want to waste another moment. He had asked his former teacher where he was and gone to meet him.
The café was housed in an old working-class cottage, set back off the road and wedged between a dry cleaner and a thrift shop. Preach parked and waited for Kirby. Two bums idled on the sidewalk outside the thrift shop, sharing a cigarette. The whole block was scruffy.
When Kirby pulled up two minutes later, he said he’d uncovered nothing further at Elliott’s house. “You know what this place is, right?” Kirby asked.
Preach swiveled to take in the café. “A place to get coffee? Grubby and hip?”
“It’s a kava bar.”
Preach frowned. “I have to confess my ignorance.”
“Kava’s a plant from the South Pacific. They use the root to make an herbal beverage that’s supposed to have a calming effect. It tastes like dirt, but it’s a stimulant, and it also helps you relax. Weird combo, right? This is a hangout for gamer types, D&D burnouts who like a little ganja with their elves and h
alf-orcs. They say Kava and weed is a marriage made in heaven. The high without the paranoia.”
“D&D?”
“Dungeons & Dragons.” Kirby looked embarrassed. “I was into it as a kid.”
“Okay,” Preach said with a chuckle, then started for the door. Kirby grabbed his arm. “You know Mac owns this place, right? It’s a front.”
Preach stopped walking. He did not know.
“You think your guy’s part of Mac’s crew?” Kirby asked.
“He’s a retired English teacher, has to be seventy-five by now. Though I guess you never know.” Preach started for the door again, this time with his right hand hovering near his holster.
As they entered, the detective’s eyes swept the café. The dark, narrow front room was one long tiki bar, complete with thatch fringe hanging from the ceiling. The floor, low ceiling, and cement walls were all painted purple, giving the place a weightless, psychedelic feel. Flat-screen monitors displayed a continuous loop of waves crashing on a tropical beach.
Near the entrance, a pair of tattooed men dressed in jeans and worn surfer T-shirts, baseball caps pulled low, turned when Preach and Kirby entered. One was clean-shaven with scarred and muscled forearms, the other sported a bushy goatee. Both had what Preach called gutter eyes. Lightless orbs that reflected the soiled environment in which they lived.
Two grizzled men and a much younger woman huddled over a card game at the other end of the bar. The place smelled like sassafras-scented antiseptic. A sign above the bar displayed the menu: seven and ten dollar shots of kava, single and double. And nothing else.
Definitely a front.
The two thugs ran their eyes over Preach and Kirby. There was no sign of a weapon, so Preach brushed past them. He waved off the bartender and approached the trio at the far end of the bar, recognizing one of the older men as Elvis Klein. The former teacher’s shoulders were still broad, his chin still firm, but the long ponytail had grayed, and wrinkles crisscrossed his craggy face.
Elvis looked up from his hand of cards, which contained an assortment of wizards, warriors, and mythical beasts. The painfully thin younger woman, who had dyed green hair, scowled at the interruption.
“Whoa, Joe Everson.” Elvis Klein said, with a firm handshake. He had always spoken like an erudite surfer, even in class.
The whole scene seemed surreal to Preach, a stop in wonderland during a murder investigation. But even Carroll’s Wonderland, for all its quirks and childhood magic, was a dark, dark place.
“Thanks for meeting,” Preach said. “I won’t take up much of your time. Can we speak outside?”
Elvis set down his cards. “Let’s use the back room. No one’s ever there, and I won’t be tempted to smoke.”
He led them through a beaded curtain to a small room at the rear of the establishment. It was empty except for two couches facing a projector screen displaying the same hypnotic wave patterns as the monitors out front.
Elvis sprawled on one of the couches. “The Byronic Wilderness Society, huh? That’s a blast from the past.” He gave a nervous chuckle. “The officer who called implied it might have something to do with those crazy literary murders, but I didn’t think he was . . .”
He trailed off when Preach grimaced. “I can’t disclose details, but it’s potentially germane to the investigation.”
Elvis swung to an upright position. “No shit? How can I help?”
“What can you tell me about the Society?”
His former teacher’s eyes went distant. “For about two years, they published an anonymous piece for each edition of the school paper. It showed up in my office every quarter the night before we went to press, slid underneath the door. Sometimes it was a poem, sometimes it was a short story, sometimes it was more experimental. But it was always excellent, and always packed with veiled gossip on the social scene. Who was sleeping with who, whose parents were divorcing, who had smoked dope for the first time. We teachers didn’t realize this until later, of course. No one ever knew for sure who was in the club, but all the kids seemed to want to be. It was an unusual class—lots of really bright kids.”
“Do you think Damian Black and Farley Robertson were members?”
“That’s what the other students seemed to think, and I have to say, they were the best candidates. Both very good writers. Farley was better than Damian—ironic that. Both were also precocious enough to pull it off. Farley in particular, because he was snarky. Whoa, was he ever. Could strip another kid to his skivvies with a few words.”
“Damian, too?”
“Not so much,” he said slowly. “He was a likeable kid, seemed to be everybody’s friend. But he was thick as thieves with Farley, and you know what they say about that. He was also . . . you remember I ran the drama club?”
“I do.”
“Let’s just say that Damian Black—Evan Shanks at the time—well, he was one helluva actor.”
Preach and Kirby exchanged a glance.
“If you had to guess,” Preach said, “Who else might have been in the Society?”
Elvis scratched at his scalp. “There was Lisa Fonce—pretty as a peach and clever as a hungry raccoon. Though I’m not sure she cared about, well, anything enough to put in the extra work. Bryce Yaw, Delia Hernandez, maybe Ryan Whiteman.” He wagged a finger. “You know which two I’d bet on, now that I think about it? One was—”
He cut off, his face slowly draining of color. “Elliott Fenton.”
Preach heard a cell phone go off in the front room. The ring tone had the deep, distorted chords of a death metal riff. “Is that one of your friend’s phones?” he asked quietly.
“Don’t think so,” Elvis said.
Preach unsnapped his holster with his thumb, shifting so he was facing the beaded doorway. He motioned with his eyes for Kirby to watch the fire exit.
“You mentioned a second candidate for the Society,” Preach said.
“She wasn’t literary—whip-smart but not artistic—but Becky Farmer was mixed up with the other three, and was definitely into everyone’s business. Which makes sense for a politician.”
“A politician?” Preach echoed, growing cold at what he sensed was coming.
Becky. Rebecca.
“Farmer was her maiden name. It’s Worthington now, of course. Creekville’s illustrious mayor.”
Preach’s hands clenched against his sides. Her maiden name—that’s why he hadn’t noticed her in the yearbook.
“She was the hottest thing in town back then. Still a looker.” Elvis shook his head. “Mean as a snake, though. She and Farley had a thing for a while.”
“Isn’t Farley gay?” Preach asked.
“He probably was, but back then that was still taboo around here. Maybe he slept with her to save face. But it didn’t last, and she turned her attentions to Damian. For whatever reason, he wasn’t interested, and she pined for him like nothing you’ve ever seen. That’s a sight to behold, isn’t it? A beautiful woman denied what she wants.”
A beautiful woman denied what she wants.
“What about Elliott?” Preach asked. “Did he ever date Rebecca?”
“Only in his dreams. Elliott pined after Becky Farmer as bad as she pined after Evan.”
I guess Elliott finally got what he wanted, Preach thought. Except for the part where he got murdered.
“So the four of them were friends, even with all the jealousy and unrequited love?” Kirby asked.
Elvis scoffed. “You know how kids are. High school is a blender full of ingredients that don’t go together.” His eyes visited the past again. “I seem to remember something different about their senior year. At least the second semester. They didn’t seem as close . . .” He snapped his fingers. “The last submission we received from the Byronic Wilderness Society was just before Christmas break that year.”
“Just before things changed,” Preach said grimly.
“Whoa.”
“This stays between us.”
Elvis nodded as Pre
ach eyed the beaded doorway. The sound of chatter from the front had ceased. Surely, he thought, Mac’s thugs wouldn’t attack a cop in broad daylight—even if they were getting orders from the mayor.
“Last question,” he said, slipping his fingers around the hilt of his weapon. “Crime and Punishment, The Murders in the Rue Morgue—do those two books mean anything to you? Together?”
He shook his head. “I saw them on the news and thought about it already. Couldn’t come up with anything.”
Preach swallowed his disappointment, then took Elvis by the arm. “Let’s use the back door. I think your friends might have left.”
Elvis looked nervous, out of his depth. Kirby had picked up on the danger vibe and led the way to the fire exit.
Locked.
Preach swore and gripped the butt of his weapon. “I’ll go first,” he said, then turned to Kirby. “If something goes down, keep him safe and radio for help.”
“You don’t want to call it in now?” Kirby said.
“Call in what? Two unarmed men at a bar? They’re already ready to crucify me.”
Kirby’s nostrils flared, and his eyes went hard. Preach bent to check underneath the beaded curtain. No sign of shoes. He stood and pushed through, ready to draw.
The breath he was holding seeped out when he saw Mac’s men still sitting at the bar. Elvis’s friends had gone silent because they were bent over the woman’s cell phone. Preach could hear the synthesized sound of a video game.
He let his hands unclench. He was too on edge.
Elvis rejoined his friends. Just before Preach reached the front door, one of Mac’s men, the one with the goatee and a Charlotte Hornets cap, dropped his mug at Preach’s feet. It shattered, spraying Preach’s pants with kava.
“Oops,” the man said. Tattoos covered him like hieroglyphs. “My bad.”
Kirby’s hand flew to his holster. Preach stepped away from the shards and put a hand on his partner’s shoulder. “Let’s go. We have bigger fish to fry.”
The man with the goatee jumped off his stool, blocking their path. “That’s right, Ace,” he said to Kirby. “Walk away.”
